AI Coding Tools Pricing Comparison 2026

As of October 18, 2026, the paid entry point for the big terminal agents is still about $20 a month: Claude Pro ($20, with Claude Code) and ChatGPT Plus ($20, with Codex). Cursor no longer sells a $20 plan: its lineup is now Plus ($8, Grok models only) and Premium ($30). GitHub Copilot Pro stays at $10 and Google Antigravity has a free individual tier. The heavy-use tiers now run from $100 to $500: Claude Max ($100 or $200), ChatGPT Pro (Pro 100, Pro 200 and Pro 500), Cursor Super ($100) and Ultra ($200), and Copilot Max ($100). The biggest real differences are in how usage is metered, not the sticker price.

Updated October 18, 2026: prices were re-checked against our verified AI coding tool plans dataset, where every value carries a verbatim vendor quote. Cursor moved to Free, Plus $8, Premium $30, Super $100 and Ultra $200 with one weekly usage pool, and its old Hobby, Pro, Pro+ and Teams Standard/Premium plans are now labelled legacy. ChatGPT Pro is now Pro 100, Pro 200 and Pro 500, and Pro 200 is open to new subscriptions again. windsurf.com/pricing now redirects to devin.ai/pricing, so the old Windsurf plan rows are gone. Devin, Zed, Augment, Lovable, Kiro and GitHub Copilot's billing (AI credits, with premium requests only on legacy annual plans) were corrected, and Gemini CLI now shows Google's own pages disagreeing about who can still use it. See What Changed on October 18.

Previous update (October 9, 2026): Gemini CLI was corrected throughout: since June 18, 2026 it no longer serves free or Google AI Pro/Ultra users, who were moved to Antigravity CLI (Google's announcement), and it now runs only on paid Gemini API keys, Vertex AI and Gemini Code Assist Standard/Enterprise. On September 28, 2026, Claude, Codex, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Antigravity, and Claude Cowork prices were re-verified against their official pages that day - see What Changed on September 28. Windsurf, Devin, Augment, Kiro, Zed, and the app builders were not re-checked in this pass and carry their earlier verification dates. Verify any plan detail against the official pricing page before you buy.

Official Sources#

The AI coding tool market has more options and more pricing complexity than ever. Some tools are free. Some cost $200 a month. Some charge per task or per credit. Figuring out what you actually get for your money means digging through pricing pages, fair-use policies, and fine print that changes monthly. If you are choosing by workflow first, the AI coding tools comparison matrix is the companion piece to keep open.

Previous update (August 27, 2026): Claude Sonnet 5's $2/$10 per MTok rate is now the permanent standard price: Anthropic confirmed on its pricing page (August 15, 2026) that the previously scheduled September 1 increase to $3/$15 will not occur, so any "promo ends August 31" framing in the July sections below is outdated. Anthropic Opus 5 is confirmed with Fast Mode at 2x standard pricing. Opus 4.8 now listed as a legacy model on the official pricing page. OpenAI's GPT-5.6 Sol dropped to $4/$20 per MTok on the API (from $5/$30), with promotional pricing through at least November 21, 2026. All prices verified August 27, 2026, except Windsurf and Devin rows, which were rate-limited during this check and still carry their July 27 verification. Verify any plan detail against the official pricing page before you buy.

For the newest numbers, see the Recent Pricing Changes section below, and for how the Fable 5 tier shifts cost-per-task math, the Fable 5 cost analysis. If you run agent fleets rather than a single session, the economics of Fable 5 orchestrators and Sonnet 5 workers works through the one-expensive-manager, many-cheap-workers math.

For Anthropic's newest budget worker, see the Claude Haiku 5.5 release guide. The key pricing caveat is the 100K-token cliff: it can be very cheap for bounded Copilot and subagent tasks, but long replayed contexts need fresh token counts.

If you only need the fastest decision path:

• Compare workflow fit first: AI coding tools comparison matrix
• Compare the top 3 agent styles: Claude Code vs Cursor vs Codex
• Want a ranked shortlist first: /best/ai-coding-tools
• Jump straight to commercial intent: /pricing and /compare

This is the complete breakdown. Every major AI coding tool, what each tier costs, what it includes, and where the hidden costs live. Core source links re-checked September 28, 2026. If you want to plug your own usage numbers in before you commit, run them through our AI cost calculator and you will get a per-month estimate across providers in a few seconds.

If you are comparing tools rather than just reading the sticker price, keep three companion pages open: the AI coding tools comparison matrix, and the Claude Code vs Cursor vs Codex breakdown. Those pages go deeper on tradeoffs, recent plan changes, and which tool fits which workflow.

Pricing Sources and Freshness#

Pricing changes quickly, especially for tools that mix subscriptions, credits, premium model pools, and usage-based billing. Treat these as checked public prices, not permanent guarantees. For purchase decisions, verify the official pricing page before you buy.

For tool selection after budget, use best AI coding tools 2026.

What Changed on October 18#

Every value below comes from our AI coding tool plans dataset, verified October 18, 2026, where each price and limit carries a verbatim quote from the vendor's own page. Quotes are reproduced exactly as the vendor wrote them.

• Cursor replaced its plan lineup. The pricing page now lists Free ($0), Plus ("$8/month", and "Only Grok models are available on this plan"), Premium ("$30/month", 4x Plus usage), Super ("$100/month", 15x), Ultra ("$200/month", 50x), Teams ("$30+/user/month") and Enterprise (custom). The two-pool split is gone for new plans: per Cursor's usage limits help, "every paid plan includes one weekly pool of usage for Cursor models (Grok 4.7, Grok 4.6, Grok 4.5, and Composer 2.5), shared across Cursor, Grok Bot, and the Grok apps." The plans this post used to list are now "Legacy Cursor plans (Hobby, Start, Pro, Pro+, Ultra, and Teams Standard and Premium seats)", which keep two monthly pools. The pricing page also says "Subscriptions are only sold directly through X Subscription Corp." Full quotes: Cursor plans.
• ChatGPT Pro is now three tiers. OpenAI's Pro tiers article lists Pro 100 ($100), Pro 200 ($200) and Pro 500 ($500), and says "Pro 200 is also available for new subscriptions again. New subscriptions that aren't eligible for grandfathering include a lower usage allowance." It adds: "Eligible customers can use the previous included allowance through October 29, 2026 while their Pro 200 subscription is active." On the Codex pricing page: "GPT-5.5 retires from Codex with ChatGPT sign-in on October 14, 2026, at noon PDT (19:00 UTC)." Full quotes: Codex plans.
• GitHub Copilot bills in AI credits. Per GitHub's billing docs, "1 AI credits = $0.01 USD". Pro includes 1,500 credits a month, Pro+ 7,000 and Copilot Max ($100 USD per month) 20,000. Premium requests survive only for a narrow group: the legacy docs say they apply "only to Copilot Pro and Copilot Pro+ subscribers on an existing annual plan who remained on legacy premium request-based billing after June 1, 2026." Full quotes: GitHub Copilot plans.
• Windsurf has no separate pricing page. windsurf.com/pricing redirects to devin.ai/pricing, and the pages read on October 18 show no separate Windsurf plan. The editor is sold as Devin Desktop on Devin's plans.
• Devin's plans replace the old beta and team prices. The Devin pricing page lists Free ($0), Pro ("$20per month", as the page renders it), Max ("$200per month"), Teams ("$80/month for team plan + $40/mo per full dev seat") and Enterprise ("Let's talk"). Usage changed too: "In March 2026, Devin Desktop replaced the credit-based system with a quota-based usage system" (quota docs). Full quotes: Devin plans.
• Gemini CLI: Google's own pages disagree. The quota and pricing page says "Unpaid tier and Google One users: Gemini CLI was replaced by Antigravity CLI on June 18th, 2026." The same page's quota table still lists "Google AI Pro 1,500 requests" and "Google AI Ultra 2,000 requests" per user per day. It also says "Gemini CLI has not been optimized for Gemini 4 Argon. To use Gemini 4 Argon, please use Antigravity." Full quotes: Gemini CLI plans.
• Zed, Augment, Lovable and Kiro corrections. Zed Pro is "$10per month" and Business "$30per seat, per month" (Zed pricing). Augment lists "STANDARD $20/month flat, no per-seat charge" and "BUSINESS $100/month flat, no per-seat charge", with no free plan stated (Augment pricing). Lovable's $25 plan is Pro: "$25 / month 100 monthly credits" (Lovable pricing). Kiro lists "KIRO PRO $20 per user / month 1,000 credits" (Kiro pricing).

October 2026 price table#

What Changed on September 28#

A full re-verification of the tools with the most pricing search interest. Everything in this section was checked against official pages on September 28, 2026.

Parts of this section are now superseded: Cursor's plans, ChatGPT Pro sign-ups and the GPT-5.5 retirement wording changed after September 28. See What Changed on October 18 for the current values.

Claude Code (Anthropic). Claude Code is included in Pro and Max, not Free.

On the API side, Anthropic's pricing page now lists Opus 5.5 at $4/$20 per MTok (with Fast Mode at 2x standard pricing), Fable 5.1 at $10/$50, Sonnet 5 at $2/$10, and Haiku 4.5 at $1/$5. Opus 5 has moved to the legacy list at $5/$25. On consumer plans, Fable is paid with usage credits on Pro and capped at 50% of weekly limits on Max. See the Opus 5.5 release guide for what the new default model changes.

Claude Cowork. There is no separate Cowork price. The Cowork page says it works with a paid plan, and Anthropic's banner reads "Claude Cowork is now just Claude," rolling out to Pro and Max first. Team seats list "Claude Code and Claude Cowork" together. Cowork runs on your plan's usage, so heavy Cowork use can push you toward Max. We break down which one to reach for in Claude Cowork vs Claude Code.

OpenAI Codex. Codex is bundled into ChatGPT plans, and ChatGPT Work now shares the same usage limits:

Two things to know before you buy: OpenAI's help center says new sign-ups and upgrades to the Pro $200 plan are temporarily paused (existing subscriptions keep renewing), and GPT-5.5 retires from ChatGPT and Codex on October 14, 2026. OpenAI publishes estimated local messages per five-hour window by model; for example, GPT-6 Sol is listed at 15 to 150 on Plus versus 300 to 3,000 on Pro 20x. Our Codex usage limits and pricing guide walks through those windows in detail.

Cursor (and Composer). Plan prices are unchanged: Hobby free, Pro $20, Pro Plus $60, Ultra $200, Teams $40 Standard or $120 Premium. What changed is the Cursor Models pool, which now covers Grok 4.7, Grok 4.6, Grok 4.5, and Composer 2.5. Per Cursor's model pricing docs, Composer 2.5 is $0.50 input and $2.50 output per MTok ($3/$15 in Fast mode), far below third-party frontier models in the Other Models pool, such as Claude Opus 5.5 at $4/$20. Cursor also lists a Start plan for developers in India at 649 rupees a month that covers only the Cursor Models pool. Cursor's own guidance: daily agent users typically spend $60 to $100 a month in total usage. See the Composer 2.5 developer guide for how the model performs.

GitHub Copilot. Free ($0, 2,000 completions a month), Pro $10 ($15 in monthly AI credits), Pro+ $39 ($70), Max $100 ($200). Business is $19 per seat and Enterprise $39 per seat. New on the plan page: Pro includes access to third-party agents, naming Claude Code and Codex.

Google Antigravity. Antigravity has a free individual tier with unlimited tab completions and weekly rate limits, using Gemini 3.8 Flash, Gemini 3.1 Pro, Claude Sonnet and Opus 4.6, and gpt-oss-120b. Higher limits come from Google AI plans: Google AI Pro at $19.99/mo and Google AI Ultra from $99.99/mo (well below the $250 Ultra price this post listed earlier). Pro and Ultra can buy AI credits for overage. Organizations get Antigravity through Google Cloud with consumption-based pricing. For how it compares as an agent, see Antigravity CLI vs Claude Code vs Codex.

September 2026 price table for the big six#

Historical snapshot from September 28, 2026. For current prices, use the October 2026 price table.

What Changed on August 27#

• Claude Sonnet 5's promotional pricing is now permanent. Anthropic's pricing page (verified August 27, 2026) lists Sonnet 5 at $2 input / $10 output per MTok with no end date, and explicitly states the previously scheduled September 1 increase to $3/$15 will not occur. Every "Sonnet 5 promo ends August 31" note in the July sections of this post is outdated - treat $2/$10 as the going rate. Opus 5 remains at $5/$25 with Fast Mode at 2x ($10/$50), and Opus 4.8 stays listed as a legacy model.
• OpenAI cut GPT-5.6 Sol to $4/$20 per MTok. The API pricing page now lists Sol at $4 input / $20 output (cached $0.40), down from $5/$30, with long-context rates of $8/$30 and promotional pricing through at least November 21, 2026. The lower rate also flows through to Codex and ChatGPT Work usage counting, stretching subscription quotas further.
• Cursor restructured individual limits into two usage pools. Per Cursor's pricing docs, Pro/Pro+/Ultra each include a Cursor Models pool (Grok 4.6, Grok 4.5, Composer 2.5) plus an Other Models pool charged at the selected model's API rate, with on-demand usage billed at the same rates. Prices are unchanged: Pro $20, Pro+ $60, Ultra $200, Teams Standard $40, Premium seat $120. (Superseded October 18, 2026: these are now legacy plans, and current paid plans share one weekly pool for Cursor models. See What Changed on October 18.)
• GitHub Copilot Pro+ is now a permanent part of the individual lineup at $39/mo with 4x+ Pro's included usage and $70 in monthly credits, between Pro ($10) and Max ($100).

All prices verified August 27, 2026. Windsurf and Devin pricing pages were rate-limited during this check, so their rows still carry July 27 verification - verify those before purchasing.

What Changed on July 27#

• Kimi K3 open weights now available. Moonshot AI delivered the full 2.8T-parameter model weights and inference code on Hugging Face and ModelScope as promised July 27. The model already has 5.7k likes and 2,850 downloads on Hugging Face. API pricing remains $3/$15 per MTok. See the Kimi K3 developer guide for architecture details and the access comparison post for every provider route.
• Anthropic Opus 5 Fast Mode confirmed at 2x pricing. The official pricing page now lists Opus 5 with Fast Mode at 2x standard pricing ($10/$50 per MTok) for workloads that need up to 2.5x faster speeds, alongside the standard $5/$25 per MTok rate. Prompt caching is confirmed at $6.25/$0.50 write/read.
• Opus 4.8 now marked as legacy model. Anthropic's pricing page now lists Opus 4.8 under the "Legacy models" section. Pricing unchanged ($5/$25 per MTok) but the labeling shift signals deprecation direction. Opus 5 is the recommended replacement at the same price point with better reasoning.
• Claude Sonnet 5 promotional pricing confirmed. The $2/$10 per MTok intro rate continues through August 31, 2026. Standard pricing after September 1 will be $3/$15 per MTok. Confirmed on the official pricing page July 27.

All prices verified July 27, 2026.

What Changed on July 24#

• Kimi K3 open weights delayed to July 27. Moonshot AI announced a three-day delay from the original July 24 release target. The full 2.8T-parameter model weights and inference code would be available on Hugging Face and ModelScope on July 27. API pricing remains $3/$15 per MTok. Early access partners reported 15-20% speed improvements over the initial launch build.
• Claude Sonnet 5 promotional pricing status confirmed. Anthropic reconfirmed the $2/$10 per MTok intro rate continues through August 31, 2026. After September 1, expect $3/$15 per MTok. Current Sonnet 5 usage counts against plan limits during the promo period, not usage credits.
• GPT-5.6 capacity updates. OpenAI reported infrastructure improvements that stabilized GPT-5.6 Sol tier access for all Plus and Pro users. The temporary five-hour usage limit from July 13-15 is now permanently removed. Sol tier response times improved 12% on average across coding workloads.

What Changed on July 17#

• Kimi K3 launched with 2.8T parameters. Moonshot AI released Kimi K3, a 2.8-trillion-parameter Mixture-of-Experts model with native vision and a 1M-token context window. API pricing is $3 per million input tokens, $0.30 cached, and $15 per million output tokens. Full weights promised by July 27. See the Kimi K3 developer guide for architecture details and cost math.
• Gemini 3.5 Pro missed its July 17 target. Google's rebuilt Gemini 3.5 Pro missed its third consecutive deadline. The model remains in limited enterprise preview on Vertex AI. Polymarket now shows 81% probability of a July 31 delivery. The public Gemini API does not list a 3.5 Pro model ID.
• Fable 5 countdown: two days left. Pro, Max, Team, and Enterprise subscribers have until Saturday July 19 at 11:59 PM PT to use Fable 5 at included rates. Starting Sunday July 20, all Fable 5 usage runs on usage credits at $10/$50 per MTok.

All prices verified July 17, 2026.

What Changed on July 15#

• Codex and ChatGPT Work hit 8 million active users. OpenAI reported the milestone on July 14-15, up from 1 million in February and 6 million just three days earlier. Sam Altman called GPT-5.6 Sol growth "insane" and cited a 2.5x spike in agentic product usage over the prior week.
• OpenAI keeping GPT-5.6 Sol limits lifted. OpenAI said it will continue operating without the five-hour rate limit through the user surge, giving all plans more access to GPT-5.6 Sol across Codex and ChatGPT Work.
• Fable 5 deadline unchanged at July 19. Four days remain at included rates. Pro, Max, Team, and Enterprise subscribers can use Fable 5 for up to 50% of weekly limits until 11:59 PM PT on Saturday. Starting July 20, all Fable 5 usage runs on usage credits at $10/$50 per MTok.

All prices verified July 17, 2026.

What Changed on July 14#

• Fable 5 plan access extended to July 19. Anthropic announced the third extension on July 12, giving Pro, Max, Team, and Enterprise subscribers another week of Fable 5 at included rates. The deadline is now Sunday, July 19 at 11:59 PM PT. After that, Fable 5 transitions to usage-based billing at $10/$50 per MTok. This represents the third delay since the original June 22 cutoff as Anthropic works to secure capacity.
• OpenAI lifted GPT-5.6 Sol usage limits temporarily. Following intense demand after the Codex and ChatGPT Work launches, OpenAI removed the five-hour usage restriction for Plus, Pro, and Business plans on July 13. Usage counters were reset for all users. OpenAI also rolled out efficiency improvements to GPT-5.6 Sol that reduce token consumption while handling the same workload.
• Kimi K2.7 Code now on Copilot Business and Enterprise. Moonshot AI's K2.7 Code model, previously available only to Copilot Pro, Pro+, and Max plans, is now additionally available on Copilot Business and Copilot Enterprise tiers.

All prices verified July 17, 2026.

What Changed on July 12#

• GPT-5.6 global rollout continues. OpenAI is rolling out GPT-5.6 across ChatGPT, Codex, and the API globally. The three-tier Sol family is now more widely available: Sol ($5/$30 per MTok) for frontier reasoning, Terra ($2.50/$15) as a balanced everyday model, and Luna ($1/$6) as the fastest option. CEO Sam Altman noted Sol is 54% more token efficient on agentic coding tasks.
• GitHub Copilot adds session spend limits. You can now set AI credit session limits in Copilot CLI and the GitHub Copilot SDK to cap the amount an agent spends in a single session. This addresses the unpredictable credit consumption that hit some teams after the June billing transition.

All prices verified July 12, 2026.

What Changed on July 11#

• ChatGPT Work launched. OpenAI released ChatGPT Work, powered by GPT-5.6, to turn scattered notes and drafts into finished work. It brings together context from your team's tools with multi-agent capabilities that run concurrent subagents. Available to all ChatGPT plans on desktop, rolling out to web and mobile over the next few days. GPT-5.6 in Work uses Max mode by default; Ultra mode is available to Pro and Enterprise users.
• GPT-5.6 Sol family pricing confirmed. The three-tier Sol family is now in limited preview with confirmed API pricing: Sol ($5/$30 per MTok) for frontier reasoning, Terra ($2.50/$15) as a balanced everyday model at 2x lower cost than GPT-5.5, and Luna ($1/$6) as the fastest and most affordable option.
• Claude Code 2.1.207 released. Auto mode is now available without opt-in on Bedrock, Vertex AI, and Foundry. Bedrock, Vertex, and Claude Platform on AWS default to Claude Opus 4.8. Key fixes include terminal freezing during long streams, spurious prompt-injection warnings, and Bedrock credential handling. Shell-injection hardening blocks ${user_config.*} in plugin hook commands.
• Claude Monthly Recap feature. A new Reflect feature in Settings shows topics you spent time on, your most active day and peak hour. Available in beta across Free, Pro, and Max plans with memory enabled.

What Changed on July 9#

• Fable 5 is now API-only. The promotional window that restored Fable 5 to Pro/Max/Team plans ended July 7. From July 8 onward, Fable 5 access requires API billing at $10/$50 per MTok. Route premium coding work through Sonnet 5 ($2/$10 intro pricing) or Opus 4.8 ($15/$75) if you want to stay on your subscription.
• Claude Cowork expanded to web and mobile. Claude Cowork - the agentic work assistant with Microsoft 365 write tools - is now available on web and mobile in addition to desktop, rolling out to Max plan users first. Claude can now draft, send, and organize email, manage calendar events, and create files in OneDrive and SharePoint.
• Claude Code 2.1.205 released July 8. Key reliability fixes: auto mode now blocks tampering with session transcript files, fixed --json-schema silently failing on invalid schemas, fixed messages sent while Claude was working being lost at --max-turns limit. Full changelog at code.claude.com/docs/en/changelog.
• Claude for Government public beta. Claude Code and Claude Cowork are now in public beta for Claude for Government Desktop - FedRAMP High authorized AI with tamper-evident audit logs and spend governance.
• Meta Muse Spark 1.1 API launched. Meta opened its first paid AI model to developers through the new Meta Model API. Muse Spark 1.1 offers a 1M token context window, tool calling, and MCP support at $1.25/$4.25 per MTok - significantly cheaper than Claude or GPT for high-volume agentic workloads. US developers get $20 in free credits. See our Meta Muse Spark 1.1 developer guide for the full breakdown.

All prices verified July 9, 2026.

What Changed on July 8#

• Cursor Teams pricing overhaul. Cursor split Teams seat usage into two separate pools: one for Composer and Auto (first-party Cursor models), and one for third-party API models (Claude, GPT, Gemini). Standard seats stay at $40/mo with more total usage. A new Premium seat ($120/mo) offers 5x Standard usage for power users running heavy agent workloads. Cursor estimates the changes lower costs for 90% of teams.
• VS Code 1.128 released. Multi-chat support for Claude agent sessions lets you run related conversations in parallel, compare approaches, and branch from earlier turns. Copilot Vision is now generally available in VS Code Chat - attach images and PDFs by pasting, dragging, or dropping them. See our VS Code 1.128 developer guide.
• GPT-5.6 Sol family still in limited preview. Sol ($5/$30), Terra ($2.50/$15), and Luna ($1/$6) remain available only to selected API and Codex partners. No general availability date announced yet.
• Sonnet 5 introductory pricing continues. The $2/$10 per MTok intro rate runs through August 31, 2026. After that, expect $3/$15 per MTok.

What Changed on July 7#

• Fable 5 promotional window ended. The deadline hit on July 7 - Fable 5 is now API-only at $10/$50 per MTok.
• OpenAI previewed GPT-5.6 Sol. The three-tier Sol family is in limited preview: Sol for frontier reasoning and long-horizon agentic work, Terra as a balanced everyday model at 2x lower cost than GPT-5.5, and Luna as the fastest and most affordable option. See our GPT-5.6 Sol developer guide for the full breakdown.
• ChatGPT Pro pricing restructured. ChatGPT Pro now offers $100/mo with 5x usage or $200/mo with 20x usage. The Go tier moved from $6 to $8/mo. Business is $20/user/mo on annual billing ($25 monthly). GPT-5.5 Instant is the default model across all tiers.
• Claude Code default permissions changed. The default permission mode is now Manual across CLI, VS Code, and JetBrains. This affects new installs and fresh sessions.

What Changed on July 6#

• Fable 5 final countdown. After the June 30 US export control lift, Fable 5 was restored to Pro/Max/Team plans at 50% limits through July 7.
• Sonnet 5 became default. As of July 4, Claude Sonnet 5 replaced Sonnet 4.6 as the default model.
• Copilot Vision is GA. GitHub Copilot's vision capabilities moved to general availability as of July 4. Premium model selections draw from your AI Credit pool.
• Kimi K2.7 Code added to Copilot. Moonshot AI's K2.7 Code model is now available in GitHub Copilot's model roster.
• Cursor iOS beta launched. 75% off iOS promo ended July 5. Cursor Teams now includes MCP support.

Recent Pricing Changes (June 2026)#

The June 2026 pricing wave moved several tools at once:

• GitHub Copilot usage-based billing is live. As of June 1, 2026, all Copilot plans transitioned to usage-based billing with AI Credits. Pro includes $15/month in credits, Pro+ includes $70/month, and Max includes $200/month. Premium model selections draw from your credit pool. See GitHub Copilot's new usage-based billing for the full breakdown.
• Cursor credit system confirmed. Cursor's credit-based model remains in effect. Auto mode is unlimited; manually selecting premium models like Claude Sonnet or GPT-4 draws from your monthly credit pool equal to your plan price.
• Sonnet 4.6 launched June 17. API pricing reflects Sonnet 4.6 at $3/$15 per MTok, which replaced Sonnet 4.5 as the default Sonnet-tier model. Sonnet 4.5 remains available at the same price but is now listed under legacy models in Anthropic's docs. (Now superseded by Sonnet 5 as of July 4.)

Where Pricing Fits in the Decision Web#

Pricing should be the second filter, not the first. Use the adjacent guides this way:

• Start with what an AI coding agent is if you are still separating autocomplete, IDE agents, terminal agents, and cloud agents.
• Use the comparison matrix when you need feature-by-feature tradeoffs.
• Use Claude Code vs Cursor vs Codex for the three-tool decision most teams actually make.
• Use Cursor vs Codex when the choice is IDE-native iteration versus OpenAI's agent stack.
• Use Anthropic vs OpenAI developer experience when the decision is really platform strategy, not editor choice.

That web prevents the common mistake: picking a cheaper plan for a workflow the tool was never built to handle.

Master Pricing Table#

Now the details on every tool.

Claude Code#

Claude Code is Anthropic's terminal-native AI agent. No IDE, no editor. It reads your entire codebase, edits files, runs commands, and operates autonomously across your whole project. The reasoning quality on complex tasks is the best in class. Start with what Claude Code is, then compare it against Cursor, Codex, and Aider if you are choosing a primary agent.

Pro ($20/mo, or $17/mo billed annually): Claude Code is included, and the September 2026 plan table lists both Opus and Sonnet on Pro. Reasonable usage limits for light to moderate coding. You get the full experience: codebase-aware editing, multi-file changes, command execution. Start here if you are evaluating Claude Code for the first time.

Max 5x ($100/mo): Five times Pro usage plus priority access at high-traffic times. The practical difference is how much Opus-tier work you can run before hitting limits. Complex refactors, architectural decisions, and multi-step autonomous workflows all benefit from the stronger model.

Max 20x ($200/mo): The highest individual tier, with 20x Pro usage. Usage limits still apply, but most daily users stop thinking about them. The sub-agent architecture, skills system, and autonomous loops are all included at every tier, but the $200 plan removes the friction of watching your usage. If you ship code every day, this plan pays for itself.

What you get at every tier: Full project context, multi-file editing, terminal command execution, MCP server integration, custom skills, memory system, parallel sub-agents. The difference between tiers is model quality and usage volume, not features.

Who it is for: Developers who want the strongest reasoning model applied to their entire codebase. Heavy users who run Claude Code for hours daily should go straight to $200 Max. Light users can start at $20 and upgrade when they hit limits.

More Claude Code reading: usage limits playbook, sub-agents, agent teams, and the setup guide.

Cursor#

Cursor is a VS Code fork with AI built into every interaction. Inline completions, a chat panel, multi-file Composer edits, and an agent mode that runs commands and iterates on results.

As of October 18, 2026, Cursor sells a new lineup, and the plans this section used to describe (Hobby, Pro $20, Pro+ $60 and Teams Standard/Premium seats) are labelled legacy. Per the pricing page, "Every tier includes a pool of AI usage shared across Cursor and Grok", and "Subscriptions are only sold directly through X Subscription Corp."

Free ($0/mo): Limited agent requests and limited Chat requests. Enough to evaluate the workflow, not enough for daily development.

Plus ($8/mo): Cursor's introductory plan with a shared AI usage pool. Only Grok models are available on this plan.

Premium ($30/mo): 4x more usage than Plus, and the plan Cursor marks most popular. Premium and above include generous usage of Grok models but no allowance for third-party models, which stay available at API list price.

Super ($100/mo) and Ultra ($200/mo): 15x and 50x the usage of Plus. Third-party models are billed separately by usage.

How the allowance works: Your allowance refreshes weekly, and per Cursor's usage limits help, every paid plan includes one weekly pool for Cursor models (Grok 4.7, Grok 4.6, Grok 4.5 and Composer 2.5), shared across Cursor, Grok Bot and the Grok apps. When you reach it, you can keep going with top-offs or wait for the refresh. Legacy plans keep the older split into two monthly pools.

Teams ($30+/user/month): Seats range from 4x to 50x Plus usage and you can mix and match seat types, plus admin dashboards, privacy controls, and spending limits. Enterprise adds pooled usage and invoicing. For organizations, that visibility matters as much as the sticker price.

Who it is for: Developers who prefer working inside an IDE with visual diffs and inline completions. Plus runs Grok models only; on Premium and above, third-party frontier models are available but billed at API list price on top of the subscription, so budget for that if you rely on them. Full plan quotes are on our Cursor plans page. For a detailed comparison with terminal-based tools, see Claude Code vs Cursor.

More Cursor reading: what Cursor is, Cursor AI code editor guide, Composer 2.0 deep dive, and Cursor vs Codex.

GitHub Copilot#

GitHub Copilot is the most widely adopted AI coding tool. It lives inside VS Code, JetBrains, and Neovim. The latest version includes agent mode with terminal access and multi-file editing.

Free tier: 2,000 code completions per month plus limited agent mode and CLI use, with no credit card required. Verified students get the separate Copilot Student plan.

Pro ($10/mo): Full completions, chat, and agent mode. Unlimited completions, $15 in monthly AI credits, model selection, and access to third-party agents (Claude Code and Codex) as of September 2026. Claude Sonnet 5.5 is now also available in Copilot, which changes the practical worker-model choice for routine bug fixes and reviews; see the Sonnet 5.5 release guide. The GitHub ecosystem integration is the differentiator. Copilot sees your issues, PRs, and CI results. When you reference a GitHub issue in a prompt, it pulls the full context automatically.

Business ($19/mo per seat): Everything in Pro, plus IP indemnity, organization-wide policy controls, audit logs, and the ability to exclude specific files from training. The IP protection alone makes this the default choice for companies with legal concerns about AI-generated code. As of June 1, 2026, GitHub's own billing docs treat higher-end usage as usage-based, so seat price is no longer the whole budget story. Read our GitHub Copilot guide.

Pro+ ($39/mo) and Max ($100/mo): Pro+ includes 7,000 AI credits a month and access to premium models; Copilot Max includes 20,000 credits and priority access to premium models. Per GitHub's individual billing docs, included credits do not carry over and reset on the first day of each calendar month.

Enterprise ($39/mo per seat): 3,900 GitHub AI Credits per user per month and priority access to premium models, plus fine-tuned models trained on your organization's codebase and knowledge bases.

Watch out: Copilot now bills chat and agent work in GitHub AI Credits, where "1 AI credits = $0.01 USD", and usage beyond the included allowance draws down a budget you set. Premium requests only remain for "Copilot Pro and Copilot Pro+ subscribers on an existing annual plan who remained on legacy premium request-based billing after June 1, 2026" (legacy docs). If you lean on premium models or cloud agent runs, the overage path matters. Full quotes: GitHub Copilot plans.

Who it is for: Teams already on GitHub. The ecosystem integration is unmatched. Individual developers get solid value at $10/mo, but the agent capabilities lag behind Cursor and Claude Code.

More Copilot reading: GitHub Copilot guide, Copilot coding agent CLI, Claude Sonnet 5.5 release guide, premium requests explained, and migrating from Copilot to Claude Code.

Windsurf#

Windsurf (formerly Codeium) no longer has its own pricing page. As of October 18, 2026, windsurf.com/pricing redirects to devin.ai/pricing, and the pages we read show no separate Windsurf plan. The editor is now sold as Devin Desktop on Devin's plans, so the Free, Pro and Enterprise Windsurf tiers this section used to list are gone. See the Devin section below and Devin's plans in the vendor's own words.

Who it is for: Former Windsurf users deciding whether to stay on Devin Desktop or move. For head-to-heads, see Cursor vs Devin Desktop, our Windsurf vs Cursor analysis and SWE-1 vs Cursor Composer comparison.

Cline#

Cline is the leading open-source AI coding extension for VS Code. It is free to install, runs with your own API keys, and supports both cloud models and local models through Ollama.

Free (BYOK): The extension itself is free. You bring your own API key for Claude, OpenAI, Gemini, Azure OpenAI, or other providers. Or you run local models through Ollama and pay nothing at all. There is no subscription, no credits system, no premium tier. You pay only what your chosen model provider charges.

Typical costs: Using Claude Sonnet through the Anthropic API, heavy Cline usage runs roughly $20-50/mo in API costs depending on context size and request volume. Using local models through Ollama, the cost is zero after hardware. Using OpenAI models, costs scale with the model tier and token usage.

What you get: Full agentic capabilities including multi-file editing, terminal command execution, MCP server integration, and iterative error correction. Cline reads your project, understands context, and operates autonomously on tasks. The workflow is comparable to Cursor's agent mode or Windsurf's Cascade, but without the bundled subscription.

Trade-offs: No built-in model optimization or caching. You pay raw API prices without the bulk discounts that Cursor or Copilot might negotiate. No vendor support - you troubleshoot via GitHub issues and community Discord. No built-in usage dashboards, so tracking costs requires external monitoring.

Who it is for: Developers who want full control over model choice and cost. Power users who would exceed subscription limits anyway. Teams that need to run local models for privacy or compliance. Anyone philosophically opposed to vendor lock-in.

More Cline reading: What is Cline, Aider vs Claude Code (another open-source option), and the AI coding tools comparison matrix.

OpenAI Codex#

OpenAI Codex brings OpenAI's coding models to the terminal and to cloud task execution. It follows the same CLI-agent pattern as Claude Code: read the project, reason about changes, execute them directly. For deeper context, read the OpenAI Codex guide, Codex vs Claude Code, and Claude Code vs Cursor vs Codex.

Free / Go / Plus: Codex access is now bundled across Free, Go, and Plus plans, according to OpenAI's Codex plan documentation. That makes Codex easier to trial than it was earlier this year, but the practical allowance still depends on plan-level agentic limits, task size, and whether you add credits.

ChatGPT Go ($8/mo): The budget tier with Codex access. Raised from $6/mo as of July 2026. Basic usage for light coding sessions.

ChatGPT Plus ($20/mo): Plus remains the lowest paid Codex entry point with the CLI and cloud execution mode. Be aware: developers report that the Plus tier can be exhausted quickly on heavy coding sessions. The larger context and higher usage budgets are reasons to evaluate Pro or business plans.

ChatGPT Pro (Pro 100 $100/mo, Pro 200 $200/mo, Pro 500 $500/mo): Per OpenAI's Pro tiers article, "Pro 200 includes more usage than Pro 100" and "Pro 500 offers the highest included usage of the three plans." Pro is billed monthly only, and the Codex pricing page says "Pro plans currently have no five-hour limit", though weekly limits may apply. The earlier pause on Pro $200 sign-ups is over: "Pro 200 is also available for new subscriptions again," but new subscriptions that are not eligible for grandfathering get a lower usage allowance, and eligible customers keep the previous allowance through October 29, 2026 while their Pro 200 subscription is active. Codex on Plus runs GPT-6.1 Sol and GPT-6 Luna, and GPT-5.5 retired from Codex with ChatGPT sign-in on October 14, 2026. Full quotes: Codex plans. Similar to Claude Max in positioning: designed for all-day usage. OpenAI's coding models have received positive reviews for TypeScript type inference and complex generic patterns.

ChatGPT Business: Codex is also included with ChatGPT Business. This is the missing middle tier for teams that need admin controls, workspace settings, and shared billing without jumping straight to a custom enterprise agreement. Business usage follows OpenAI's token-based Codex rate card, so check the official Codex rate card before modeling team cost.

Enterprise/Edu: Custom pricing with workspace features, admin controls, and dedicated capacity.

Who it is for: Developers already paying for ChatGPT Plus who want a terminal agent without an additional subscription. The cloud execution mode is a unique feature. For a direct comparison, see Cursor vs Codex.

More Codex reading: Codex Cloud security playbook, Codex managed agents on AWS, Codex security research preview, and GPT-5 Codex.

Augment#

Augment is a VS Code and JetBrains extension that focuses on large codebase understanding and structured planning. The Task List feature lets you review and edit a step-by-step plan before any code changes execute.

As of October 18, 2026, Augment's pricing page states no free plan; the Dev (free) and Individual Pro ($50/mo) plans this section used to describe are no longer listed. Usage covers "LLM, Context Engine & compute".

Standard ($20/month flat): No per-seat charge. One flat price for your whole team, up to 50 seats, with $20 of usage included every month. Top-ups are pay as you go.

Business ($100/month flat): Also no per-seat charge, up to 50 seats, with $100 of usage included every month.

Enterprise: Custom pricing with bespoke usage limits and volume-based annual discounts. Team features for codebase-wide context sharing.

What makes it different: Augment indexes your entire codebase and maintains context across sessions in a way that most tools still struggle with. The Task List workflow gives you a review gate before the AI touches your code. For large monorepos and enterprise codebases, the context quality is a real differentiator.

Who it is for: Developers working on large codebases who want structured, reviewable AI assistance. Because Standard is a flat $20 for up to 50 seats, a small team can share one plan while it evaluates the tool. Full quotes: Augment plans. If you work at a company with a 500K+ line codebase, Augment's context engine is worth evaluating. For the workflow angle, read the Augment Task List breakdown.

Gemini CLI#

Gemini CLI is Google's terminal-based coding agent. It routes across Gemini 3 and Gemini 2.5 models with /model Auto and keeps one of the largest context windows available. For Google's newest model, its own quota page says: "Gemini CLI has not been optimized for Gemini 4 Argon. To use Gemini 4 Argon, please use Antigravity."

Who can still use it (Google's pages disagree): Google's quota and pricing page says "Unpaid tier and Google One users: Gemini CLI was replaced by Antigravity CLI on June 18th, 2026." That note names only unpaid and Google One users, while the same page's quota table still lists "Google AI Pro 1,500 requests" and "Google AI Ultra 2,000 requests" per user per day. Earlier versions of this post, following Google's announcement, said Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers were moved too. Treat Pro and Ultra access as unconfirmed until Google reconciles its pages. What is consistent: Gemini CLI runs on a Gemini API key or Vertex AI, where "Cost: Based on model and token usage", or on a Gemini Code Assist seat. If you were on the old free tier, see the Gemini CLI to Antigravity CLI migration guide and the Gemini CLI plans page.

Gemini Code Assist Standard and Enterprise: Per Google's Code Assist pricing, Standard is $22.80 per user per month, or $19 with an upfront annual commitment, and Enterprise is $54 per user per month, or $45 annual. Google's quota docs list 1,500 requests per user per day on Standard and 2,000 on Enterprise, aggregated across every model used with Gemini CLI or agent mode.

Antigravity (free, or Google AI Pro $19.99/mo and Ultra from $99.99/mo): Google's agentic development platform has a free individual tier with weekly rate limits. Google AI Pro raises limits with a quota that refreshes every five hours, and Ultra adds the highest limits plus third-party models. As of September 2026, Ultra starts at $99.99/mo, which narrows the old gap between $20 and $250.

Google Cloud: For enterprise workloads, Gemini CLI runs on Vertex AI with its own token-based pricing, or under Gemini Code Assist Standard and Enterprise licenses.

Who it is for: Teams that already pay for the Gemini API, Vertex AI or Gemini Code Assist and want a 1M-token terminal agent for large-context work: code review on large PRs, documentation generation, codebase analysis. Individuals looking for a free Google terminal agent should use Antigravity CLI instead. See our Gemini CLI guide, best CLI tools for AI development, and Claude vs GPT coding comparison for broader model tradeoffs.

Zed#

Zed is a Rust-native code editor built for speed. Sub-50ms latency, GPU-accelerated rendering, and built-in AI features.

Editor (Free): The editor itself is free and open source. Fast, minimal, and designed for developers who care about performance.

Personal ($0 forever): Per Zed's pricing page, unlimited use with your own API keys or external agents like Claude Agent and Codex CLI.

Pro ($10/mo): Unlimited edit predictions and $5 of tokens included, with Zed-hosted models out of the box. Beyond the included credits, Zed bills additional token usage "at API list price +10%". Zed offers "a 14-day free trial of Pro with $5 of GPT-6 Luna usage and unlimited accepted edit predictions." The integration is tighter than bolt-on extensions because AI is built into the editor's core architecture.

Business ($30 per seat, per month): Business seats don't bundle a fixed LLM credit allotment, and order forms are available at 25+ seats.

Who it is for: Performance-focused developers who want a modern editor that is not a VS Code fork. The $10/mo Pro tier sits between Cursor Plus ($8) and Premium ($30) on price but offers a fundamentally different editing experience. Full quotes: Zed plans.

Related editor comparisons: Cursor AI guide, Windsurf vs Cursor, and the AI coding tools comparison matrix.

Kiro#

Kiro is Amazon's AI coding tool that integrates with AWS services and uses a credit-based pricing system.

Free tier: Per Kiro's pricing page, the perpetual Kiro Free tier includes 50 credits a month. Enough to evaluate the tool and run a few sessions.

Paid plans: Kiro Pro is $20 per user per month with 1,000 credits, Pro+ $40 with 2,000, Pro Max $100 with 5,000, and Power $200 with 10,000. Credits reset each billing month and do not roll over, and add-on credits cost $0.04 each (overages are disabled by default). Full quotes: Kiro plans.

Credit-based pricing: Different prompts cost different amounts depending on the model and complexity. Usage scales with your AWS billing. Developers have reported that credit consumption can be unpredictable, with bugs that drained limits unexpectedly during early access.

Who it is for: Teams deep in the AWS ecosystem who want AI coding integrated with their cloud workflow. The credit-based pricing makes it harder to predict monthly costs compared to flat-rate alternatives.

Devin#

Devin is the fully autonomous software engineer. You assign tasks through Slack or a web interface, and it works independently: setting up environments, writing code, running tests, opening PRs.

Devin Desktop is also where the former Windsurf editor now lives: windsurf.com/pricing redirects to devin.ai/pricing. As of October 18, 2026, the beta ($20/mo) and Team ($500/mo per seat) prices this section used to list are replaced by these plans:

Free ($0): A light quota to code with agents, limited model availability, unlimited inline edits and unlimited Tab completions.

Pro ($20 per month): Increased quotas, including access to frontier models from OpenAI, Claude, Gemini, and SpaceXAI plus leading open source models, full model availability and free use of SWE-2. Extra usage is consumed at API pricing.

Max ($200 per month): Everything in Pro with significantly higher quotas.

Teams ($80/month for team plan + $40/mo per full dev seat): Up to 200 users. Devin's quota docs note that "New Teams plans do not include SSO".

Enterprise ("Let's talk"): Billed in Agent Compute Units (ACUs), with the exact number depending on your contract.

How usage works: "In March 2026, Devin Desktop replaced the credit-based system with a quota-based usage system" (quota docs). Each paid plan's allowance refreshes daily and weekly, and the daily quota is more than 1/7 of the weekly one. Full quotes: Devin plans.

Who it is for: Teams with strong test coverage who want to delegate well-defined tasks. At $80 a month plus $40 per full dev seat, Teams costs far less than the $500 per seat this post listed earlier, so if Devin handles even a few features per month autonomously, the math works.

Related autonomous-agent reading: what an AI coding agent is, agent infrastructure tools, long-running agent harnesses, and AI agent frameworks compared.

App Builders: v0, Lovable, Bolt#

These tools generate full applications from natural language descriptions. Different pricing model from coding assistants.

v0 (Vercel): Free tier with limited generations. Beyond that, a credit system where you pay per generation. Costs vary by complexity. Best for Next.js and shadcn/ui scaffolding.

Lovable: Free tier for one small project. Pro at $25/month with 100 monthly credits, which roll over for one month on monthly plans, and Business at $50/month (Lovable pricing). Best for MVPs and rapid product validation. See our Lovable app builder guide.

Bolt: Free tier with generous tokens. Pro at $25/mo for higher limits and faster generation. Best for browser-based prototyping with hands-on editing.

Who they are for: Developers validating product ideas quickly. Start with the free tiers and upgrade only when you have a specific project that benefits from rapid generation. For adjacent app-builder and UI workflows, read the Lovable app builder guide, create beautiful UI with Claude Code, and building SaaS with Claude Code.

Cost Per Feature Analysis#

Raw monthly cost does not tell the full story. Here is what each dollar actually buys across the tools that matter most for daily development.

Reasoning Quality Per Dollar#

The pattern: at the $200/mo tier, every major tool offers effectively unlimited usage. The real differentiation happens at $20/mo, where usage caps force you to choose which tasks deserve premium AI and which get handled by free tools.

Context Window Per Dollar#

Large codebase support varies dramatically by price tier.

Augment and Claude Code lead on context handling. Augment indexes your entire codebase and maintains that context across sessions. Claude Code loads your full project on every invocation. Codex context and credit behavior varies by ChatGPT plan and OpenAI's current rate card, which is why the Business tier matters for teams comparing Codex against seat-based tools.

Autonomy Per Dollar#

How much can each tool do without you babysitting it?

High autonomy (can run for minutes to hours unsupervised): Claude Code ($20+), Codex ($20+), Devin ($20+)

Medium autonomy (multi-step with checkpoints): Cursor Agent ($8+), Augment Task List ($20 flat), Devin Desktop, formerly Windsurf (Free plan), Cline (API costs)

Low autonomy (mostly reactive): Copilot ($10+), Zed Pro ($10), basic completions on any tool

If autonomous operation is your priority, Claude Code at $200/mo offers the best ratio of capability to cost. You can run multi-hour coding sessions with sub-agent orchestration and skills-based workflows. No other tool matches that depth of autonomous operation at any price.

What I Actually Pay#

Here is the real cost of my daily development stack:

As of October 18, 2026, neither Cursor Pro nor Augment's Dev plan appears on the vendors' current pricing pages: Cursor lists Pro as a legacy plan, and Augment states no free plan. New subscribers should use the current plans in the sections above.

Claude Code handles the heavy lifting: autonomous refactors, multi-file changes, sub-agent orchestration, CI integration, and anything that benefits from deep reasoning. Cursor handles the fast iteration: UI tweaks, quick edits, visual diffs, and the work where IDE velocity matters more than raw intelligence. Augment's free tier fills a niche for large codebase navigation and structured planning.

The $200 Max plan sounds expensive in isolation. In practice, it replaces hours of manual work every day. If you ship code professionally and your time is worth anything north of $50/hour, the math works within the first week.

Best Options by Budget#

$0/mo: The Free Stack#

Antigravity CLI free individual tier for terminal-based coding (Google's quota page says unpaid Gemini CLI users were replaced by Antigravity CLI on June 18, 2026). The Free plan of Devin Desktop, formerly Windsurf, for IDE work: a light agent quota plus unlimited inline edits and Tab completions. Cursor's Free plan for limited agent and Chat requests. v0 free tier for UI generation. Augment no longer lists a free plan.

This stack is genuinely usable. Antigravity CLI handles terminal work within its weekly compute cap. Devin Desktop's free quota handles light multi-step tasks, and its daily and weekly quotas reset on their own. You can ship real projects without paying a cent. The tradeoff is reasoning quality on complex tasks and occasional rate limits during peak hours.

$10/mo: GitHub Ecosystem#

Copilot Pro at $10/mo. The cheapest paid option with real agent capabilities. Best if your workflow is GitHub-centric and you want completions, chat, and basic agent mode without spending more.

$20 to $30/mo: Best Single Tool#

Claude Code Pro at $20/mo if you prefer terminal-based workflows and stronger reasoning, or ChatGPT Plus at $20/mo for Codex. If you want an IDE, Cursor no longer sells a $20 plan: Plus is $8/mo with Grok models only, and Premium, the plan Cursor marks most popular, is $30/mo with 4x Plus usage. If you can only pay for one tool, pick the one whose workflow you will use daily.

$50/mo: The Balanced Stack#

Cursor Premium ($30) plus Claude Pro ($20). Cursor for fast iteration and visual editing. Claude Code for autonomous tasks, refactors, and anything that benefits from stronger reasoning. This combination covers nearly every coding workflow.

$230/mo: The Power User Stack#

Claude Max ($200) plus Cursor Premium ($30). This is what heavy daily usage looks like. Claude Code runs for hours without usage anxiety. Cursor handles the quick edits and UI work. Add Antigravity CLI's free tier for high-volume tasks. This setup maximizes throughput for developers who ship code all day, every day.

$270/mo: Team Lead Stack#

Add Copilot Business ($19/seat) for GitHub ecosystem integration and IP indemnity. Add Devin Pro ($20/mo) for delegating well-defined tasks. At this budget, you are optimizing for team productivity, compliance, and the ability to parallelize work across human developers and AI agents.

Hidden Costs to Watch#

Third-party models on Cursor. Cursor's included allowance refreshes weekly and covers Cursor models (Grok and Composer). Premium and above "do not include an allowance for third-party models", which stay available at API list price, and Plus allows only Grok models. If you want Claude or GPT inside Cursor every day, budget for that usage on top of the subscription, or step up from Premium ($30) to Super ($100) or Ultra ($200) for a larger Cursor-model pool.

Codex credit and context math. OpenAI's current Codex docs say Codex is included with Plus, Pro, Business, and Enterprise/Edu plans, but the practical budget depends on credits, model usage, and context needs. Do not treat $20/mo Plus as equivalent to a full team coding budget. If you work on large codebases or run long tasks, compare Plus, Pro, and Business using the Codex rate card.

Copilot AI credit burn. Copilot now bills usage in GitHub AI Credits ("1 AI credits = $0.01 USD"), so premium models drain your monthly allowance faster than cheaper ones. Pro's 1,500 credits a month go quickly if you default to frontier models; code completions and next edit suggestions are not billed in credits. Only Pro and Pro+ annual subscribers who stayed on legacy billing after June 1, 2026 still count premium requests, where the legacy docs set Copilot code review at a multiplier of 13.

Gemini CLI access is murky. Google's quota page says unpaid tier and Google One users were replaced by Antigravity CLI on June 18, 2026, while its quota table still lists Google AI Pro and Ultra allowances. The paths that clearly still work are a Gemini API key or Vertex AI, billed on model and token usage, or a Code Assist seat ($22.80 Standard, $54 Enterprise per user per month). Large-context sessions on a pay-per-token key add up quickly, so set a budget before pointing it at a whole monorepo.

Kiro credit unpredictability. Variable credit costs per prompt make monthly budgeting difficult. AWS has acknowledged bugs that drained credits unexpectedly. Budget a 2x buffer over your expected usage until the system stabilizes.

API keys for extended features. Some tools let you bring your own API keys for additional models. This sounds flexible until you realize you are paying the tool's subscription plus raw API costs. Check whether the features you need are included in the plan or require separate API billing.

Team seat math. A $20/mo tool becomes $2,400/year for a 10-person team. Copilot Business at $19/seat is $2,280/year for the same team. Enterprise plans with custom pricing often include volume discounts that individual pricing pages do not show. Always ask for team quotes before multiplying the per-seat price.

Context window limits on cheaper plans. Lower tiers often restrict the number of files you can reference in a single prompt. If you work on large TypeScript projects with hundreds of files, the difference between a plan that loads 50 files and one that loads 200 files directly affects output quality.

Model access varies by tier. Claude Pro now lists Opus access, but Fable runs on usage credits on Pro and is capped at 50% of weekly limits on Max, and heavy Opus use burns through Pro limits quickly. Cursor Plus runs only Grok models, and Cursor's higher plans charge third-party models at API list price, so the specific models you get change with the plan and as partnerships shift. Do not assume the model you tried during a free trial is the same one you get on the cheapest paid plan.

The Bottom Line#

The market has settled into clear tiers. Free tools (Antigravity CLI, Devin Desktop's Free plan, Cursor Free, v0) are good enough for real work. The $8-30/mo tier (Cursor Plus and Premium, Copilot Pro, Claude Pro, ChatGPT Plus with Codex) covers most developers. The $100-500/mo tier (Claude Max, Cursor Super and Ultra, ChatGPT Pro 100, 200 and 500 with Codex) is for developers whose output directly generates revenue. Team plans like Copilot Business, Cursor Teams, and ChatGPT Business sit between individual subscriptions and custom enterprise contracts.

Do not stack subscriptions you do not use daily. Pick one primary tool, add a free tier tool for overflow, and upgrade only when you consistently hit limits. The best pricing strategy is the one where every dollar spent maps to hours saved.

For recommendations on which tools to pick regardless of price, see our 10 best AI coding tools ranking. For head-to-head comparisons, check the tool comparison page, the agent comparison dashboard, the comparison hub, and the AI coding tools matrix.

Frequently Asked Questions#

How much does Claude Code cost?#

As of September 28, 2026, Claude Code is included in Claude Pro at $20/mo ($17/mo billed annually), Max 5x at $100/mo, and Max 20x at $200/mo. Team seats are $20 to $25 (Standard) or $100 to $125 (Premium), and Enterprise is $20 per seat plus usage at API rates. The Free plan does not include Claude Code. The tiers differ mainly in usage volume, not features.

Is Cursor free?#

Cursor's Free plan ($0/month) includes limited agent requests and limited Chat requests. It is enough to evaluate the tool but not enough for daily development. As of October 18, 2026, the paid plans are Plus at $8/mo (Grok models only), Premium at $30/mo, Super at $100/mo and Ultra at $200/mo, all with a weekly-refreshing allowance; Teams starts at $30+/user/month. The old Pro ($20) and Pro+ ($60) plans are legacy. See Cursor plans for the quotes.

How much does GitHub Copilot cost?#

As of September 28, 2026: Free is $0 with 2,000 completions a month, Pro is $10/mo with $15 in monthly AI credits, Pro+ is $39/mo with $70, and Max is $100/mo with $200. Business is $19 per seat and Enterprise $39 per seat. Copilot bills chat, agent mode, code review, and cloud agent work in AI credits, so treat the plan price as the entry point, not the full budget.

What is the best free AI coding tool?#

For terminal work, Antigravity CLI's free individual tier (Google's quota page says unpaid Gemini CLI users were replaced by Antigravity CLI on June 18, 2026). For IDE work, the Free plan of Devin Desktop (formerly Windsurf), with a light agent quota and unlimited inline edits and Tab completions, or Cursor's Free plan. Each excels at different tasks. Using them together gives you a genuinely capable free stack that covers most coding workflows.

Is Augment Code free?#

Not on its current pricing page. As of October 18, 2026, Augment's pricing states no free plan. Standard is $20/month flat with no per-seat charge (up to 50 seats, $20 of usage included every month), Business is $100/month flat with $100 of usage, and Enterprise is custom. The Dev (free) and Individual Pro ($50/mo) plans this answer used to describe are no longer listed.

Cursor vs Claude Code: which is better value?#

They serve different workflows. Claude Pro is $20/mo, while Cursor's closest plans are now Plus at $8/mo (Grok models only) and Premium at $30/mo. Cursor is the stronger pick for IDE-based development with visual diffs and inline completions. Claude Code Pro is the best value for terminal-based autonomous coding with stronger reasoning. Many developers use both: Cursor for fast iteration, Claude Code for complex tasks. See our full comparison.

What is the cheapest AI coding tool worth paying for?#

GitHub Copilot Pro at $10/mo. You get completions, chat, and agent mode with GitHub ecosystem integration. Cursor Plus is cheaper at $8/mo but runs only Grok models. If you need more capable agent features, Claude Pro at $20/mo or Cursor Premium at $30/mo is the next step up.

How much does Windsurf cost?#

As of October 18, 2026, windsurf.com/pricing redirects to devin.ai/pricing, and the pages read show no separate Windsurf plan. The editor is sold as Devin Desktop on Devin's plans: Free ($0, light agent quota, unlimited inline edits and Tab completions), Pro ($20 per month), Max ($200 per month), Teams ($80/month for the team plan + $40/mo per full dev seat) and Enterprise (contact sales). See Devin's plans for the vendor quotes.

Is OpenAI Codex free?#

Codex has limited access on ChatGPT Free and Go ($8/mo), using GPT-6 Luna in the desktop app subject to rollout. Plus ($20/mo) is the first tier with Codex across web, CLI, IDE, and iOS. Limits vary by model and task size, and OpenAI publishes estimated messages per five-hour window on its Codex pricing page. Always check OpenAI's Codex plan documentation and Codex rate card because credit rules changed in April 2026.

How much does Google Antigravity cost?#

Antigravity has a free individual tier with weekly rate limits and access to Gemini 3.8 Flash, Gemini 3.1 Pro, Claude Sonnet and Opus 4.6, and gpt-oss-120b. For higher limits you subscribe to Google AI Pro ($19.99/mo) or Google AI Ultra (from $99.99/mo), both of which can also buy AI credits for overage. Prices verified September 28, 2026.

Is Claude Cowork included in Claude Pro?#

Yes. Claude Cowork has no separate price; it works with paid Claude plans and runs on their usage. Team plans list Claude Code and Claude Cowork together. See Claude Cowork vs Claude Code for which to use when.

How much does Cursor Composer cost?#

Per Cursor's usage limits help, every paid plan includes one weekly pool for Cursor models, which covers Grok 4.7, Grok 4.6, Grok 4.5 and Composer 2.5, though the Plus card on the pricing page says only Grok models are available on that plan. On September 28, 2026, Cursor's model docs listed Composer 2.5 at $0.50 input and $2.50 output per million tokens, or $3/$15 in Fast mode (not re-checked October 18), well below third-party frontier models, which Premium and above bill at API list price.

Do I need the $200/mo plan for any tool?#

Only if you code for 4+ hours daily and the tool is your primary development environment. The $200 tiers on Claude Code, Cursor, and Codex are designed for professional developers who would otherwise hit rate limits constantly. If you code a few hours per week, the entry paid tier on any tool is more than enough.

Continue Reading#

• Claude Max API Credits: $100 a Month, What They Cover - the new monthly API credit that sits beside Max and Team plan pricing
• Where to Access AI Models in 2026 - one hub for every model's access routes, free tiers, and per-token prices
• AI Coding Tools Comparison Matrix 2026 - broad feature and workflow comparison across every major tool
• Claude Code vs Cursor vs Codex - the core three-tool decision broken down head-to-head
• Best AI Coding Tools 2026 - overall ranking after you understand the pricing landscape
• Frontier Model API Pricing June 2026 - API rate card for the models behind these coding tools
• Windsurf vs Cursor - how budget-friendly IDE agents compare with the category leader
• AI Coding Tool Plans and Usage Limits - every plan for 18 coding tools in the vendor's own words: prices, limit windows, overage and what changed, each value quoted

Related apps#

• Agent Hub - One control panel for Claude Code, Codex, Gemini, Cursor, and 10+ AI coding harnesses. Desktop app for Mac.
• Cost Tape Cloud - Cloud cost tracking for AI agent runs. Cloud tier unlocks org-wide rollups, budgets, and alerts.

Related#

• Subscribe to DevDigest on YouTube for hands-on walkthroughs